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Understanding the Respective Roles of Personal Effort and Divine Grace in the Transformation of Human Nature · Sri Aurobindo Studies

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  It is one thing to adopt in one's own mind the idea that
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  since the divine is doing the work, we need simply accept the
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  idea and let things take their course.
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  It is an entirely different thing if we actually want to
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  accomplish the transformation needed to bring about a change
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  in human nature based on evolutionary growth and
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  development. There's a long debate about
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  whether we have free will or whether everything is determined
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  by fate or destiny, dependent origination or karmic
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  consequence. The mind wants to have a simple
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  solution that tends to be either yes or no, black or white.
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  Thus, the idea of having the divine do everything and the
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  individual not having to make any personal effort, or the
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  opposite idea that says that personal effort is the sole
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  solution and there is no need or even a reality to Divine grace
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  in action is an expression of the mind's limitations.
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  There is certainly a role for personal effort, just as there
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  is a deeper understanding of the working of the Divine Force or
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  Divine grace. Sri Aurobindo in his book The
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  Mother clarifies this point. Quote.
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  But so long as the lower nature is active, the personal effort
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  of the Saudica remains necessary.
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  The personal effort required is a triple labor of aspiration,
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  rejection and surrender. Note that a Damasic surrender,
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  refusing to fulfill the conditions and calling on God to
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  do everything and save one all the trouble and struggle is a
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  deception and does not lead to freedom and perfection.
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  End Quote. In the same text he states quote
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  reject the false notion that the divine power will do and is
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  bound to do everything for you at your demand and even though
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  you do not satisfy the conditions laid down by the
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  Supreme, reject too the false and indolent expectation that
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  the divine power will do even the surrender for you.
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  The Supreme demands your surrender to Her, but does not
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  impose it. You are free at every moment
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  till the irrevocable transformation comes, to deny
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  and to reject the Divine or to recall yourself giving if you
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  are willing to suffer the spiritual consequence.
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  Your surrender must be self-made and free.
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  It must be the surrender of a living being, not of an inert
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  automaton or mechanical tool. An inert passivity is constantly
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  confused with the real surrender.
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  But out of an inert passivity nothing true and powerful can
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  come. End Quote.
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  Sriorbindo further observes quote it.
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  The idea that the Sadhna is done by the Divine rather than by
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  oneself is a truth, but a truth that does not become effective
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  for the consciousness until or in proportion as it is realized.
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  The people who stagnate because of it are those who accept the
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  idea but do not realize so. They have neither the force of
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  Tapasia nor that of the Divine Grace.
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  On the other hand, those who can realize it feel even behind
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  their Tapasia and in it the action of the Divine Force.
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  End Quote. Reference.
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  Sri Aurobindo and the Mother Looking from Within, Chapter 5.
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  Attitudes on the Path, page 125.